ABSTRACT

The metabolic consequences of unripe plantain or a combination of unripe plantain and ginger incorporated feed on the lipid profile, Atherogenic index (Al), Coronary risk index (CR1), total and conjugated bilirubin, total proteins, albumin, creatinine, urea, pancreatic amylase, pancreatic lipase, relative liver, kidney and heart weights of streptozotocin induced diabetic rats were investigated using standard techniques. Twenty male albino rats were used and divided into four groups of 5 rats each. Group 1 (non-diabetic) received standard rat feed ; Group 2 (diabetic control) also received standard rat feed Group 3 received unripe plantain feed while Group 4 received unripe plantain + ginger feed (71:10 wlw). The experiment lasted for 28 days. The Al and CR1 of the rats were expressed as the ratios of LDL to HDL and Total cholesterol to 1-IDL respectively. The diabetic rats of groups 3 and 4 had 61.47% and 41.80% decreases in hyperglycemia compared to the diabetic control rats and the nondiabetic rats that had 29.77% and 2.09% increases in hyperglycemia. The diabetic rats fed unripe plantain or a combination of unripe plantain + ginger recorded 19.95% and 26.10% decreases in weight compared to the diabetic control rats that recorded 3 1 .21% decrease in weight unlike the non-diabetic rats that recorded 15.50% increase in weight. There were significant increases (p<0.05) of the serum HDL, xvi protein and albumin levels of the diabetic control rats compared with the nondiabetic rats. In addition, there was non-significant decreases (p>O.05) in the serum amylase levels of the diabetic control rats compared with the nondiabetic rats. There were significant decreases (pO.05) of their serum amylase level compared to the diabetic control rats. Furthermore, there were statistically non-significant differences (p>O.05) in the serum amylase, protein, albumin, total and conjugated bilirubin levels of the diabetic rats fed unripe plantain + ginger feed compared with the diabetic control rats and there were also statistically nonsignificant differences (p>O.05) in the relative heart weight of all the rats in the four groups investigated. The implication of these findings are discussed and it was concluded that unripe plantain can be used in the management of diabetes.